Hudson — RCA (Playboy Label)

Reviewed by E. Brik

"Well I know you're wondering what I'm leading to/well I wrote this song for you". And of course everybody's wondering what Hugh Hefner's doing, dragging groups and single artists, usually second-rate and always virtually unknown, from obscurity into semi-obscurity using the impetus and status of the monolithic Hefner empire.

This album is probably the best yet released on the Playboy Label, but the difference is only comparative. Very much a studio album, it comes close to being coy and pretentious. Hudson have managed to create a series of album tracks all too slightly pretty and shallow though perfectly produced. It amazed me how they managed to sound like so many different groups (Beatles, Graham Nash, Herman's Hermits) and hence how little unity existed throughout the album.

Disconcertingly they manage also to create a very antagonistic response in me when I listen to the album — perhaps because of arrogance exemplified in a comment printed on the cover: "There are few people we care about enough to call our friends".

Left to their own resources Hudson could develop a good sound of their own, if they stop using proven formulae. This album remains little more than nice, easy listening music.